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Assessing socio-economic impacts of drought and coping mechanisms: a case study on Musikavanhu area, Chipinge District, Zimbabwe
No full textDroughts and desertification are some of the major challenges that threaten sustainable development globally and food and nutrition security in developing countries. In Africa drought is part of the natural climatic variability and countries on the continent are vulnerable to the adverse impacts of drought because their economies are agriculture based. Multidimensional responses are needed to support communities in the face of a changing climate that is continuously exposing communities to shocks such as drought. Strong institutional capacity is essential for drought mitigation and response to prevent the negative social and economic impacts on vulnerable populations. This study assesses the socio economic impacts of the 2015/16 El Nino induced drought and identifies coping mechanisms, preparedness and response mechanisms that were employed in the Musikavanhu area in the Chipinge district of Manicaland Province of Zimbabwe. The Musikavanhu area is prone to drought and has an erratic rainfall pattern characterized by dry spells. Frequent droughts are making it harder and harder for households to cope with each drought occurrence. It is important to understand how rural households, during periods of drought, cope in order to determine how best to implement micro level efforts to support households as part of risk management and resilience building.
Data for the research was collected using quantitative and qualitative methods through household interviews, key informant interviews and focus group discussions. A descriptive analysis was conducted, which characterized households according to their demographics, household income and assets, socio economic impacts of the drought, household based coping strategies; livelihood based coping strategies, preparedness and response mechanisms. Results showed that, to a large extent, households in the Musikavanhu community were negatively impacted by the drought and experienced yield loss, hunger, loss of livelihoods, food shortages, and loss of livestock, depleted water sources and school drop-outs among other effects. Some of these impacts influenced the coping mechanisms that were adopted, which include selling of livestock, pulling children out of school, reduction of meals, selling of assets and begging for food from neighbours and friends. Results also showed that households that were better off before the drought and had better capabilities and assets managed to bounce back quicker and better than others. In terms of preparedness and response, there is a need to capacitate households on drought risk reduction through training and sensitization, so that they are able to deal with the effects of drought. The study recommends strengthening the absorptive capacities of households in order to improve the stability of households when drought occurs through improving knowledge on disaster risk management, access to informal safety nets and savings. The study also recommends that support should be provided to encourage livelihood diversification, asset rehabilitation, protection and accumulation at both household and community levels
Farmer perceptions of climate variability induced drought, local adaptation and mitigation measures: case study on the subsistence farming community of Siphocosini, Swaziland
No full textThe occurrence of droughts are becoming a prevalent feature in the Swaziland agricultural sector, where over 70 percent of the population is dependent on rain fed agriculture as their main source of livelihood. There is therefore an increased concern that climate variability, through drought, will further threaten the livelihoods of the already vulnerable rural families and increase the vulnerability at household and community level or even the economy of the country. The objectives of the study were to assess the social effects brought on by climate variability induced drought, determine the subsistence farmer perceptions of climate variability induced drought and to understand the local adaptation and mitigation strategies employed by the farmers. It is important to note that this study was conducted at a household level in the community of Siphocosini in Swaziland, which makes it unique, contrasting most research studies carried out at national level.
A household questionnaire and Focus Group Discussion (FGD) were used to collect both qualitative and quantitative data for the study. The descriptive statistical analysis was employed to describe the households and the social effects of climate variability induced drought. The research results indicated that farmers in the community are responding to climate variability induced drought through the implementation of several local adaptation and mitigation strategies in an attempt to build resilience. The adaptation and mitigation strategies are influenced by a number of factors, which include farmer perceptions of climate variability, technology and access to information. The research findings further revealed that there is limited comprehensive awareness of climate variability, indicating a lack of support from the public sector and private sector towards subsistence farming in the community. From the results gathered in the study recommendations such as the promotion and implementation of drought and climate variability preparedness programmes, which can educate and empower farmers to effectively adapt and mitigate effects of weather extremes, are made. The study also recommends that the adaptation strategies implemented should have a participatory approach including existing local knowledge and resources
Role of Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) in climate change adaptation and mitigation strategies: a case study on Leribe district, Lesotho
No full textClimate change and its impact have become of great concern as they threaten the production capacities of farmers throughout the world and worse in the developing world. The global warming that leads to climate change has an influence on the natural systems with changes in rainfall patterns and increasing frequencies of natural climate-induced disasters. The ever increasing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are the main sources of imminent global warming that put society at stake. In Africa farmers are highly vulnerable to the impact of climate change. The adaptive capacity is the main area of focus for every country while avoidance, mitigation and protection measures need to go beyond those that already exist as essential to support farmers already faced with impacts of climate change. This study assesses the role of NGOs in support of adaptation and mitigation strategies of climate change in rural communities of Leribe district. In Leribe district a large proportion of rural households who are farmers have access to agricultural land. Climate change impact is disturbing the farmers since there is late onset of rains and farmers’ productivity has greatly diminished. It is therefore significant to assess the role of NGOs during climate change impact to assist farmers adapt to and mitigate effects of climate change. In this study data was collected using quantitative and qualitative methods through interview questionnaires, key informant interviews and focus group discussions. A descriptive nature of analysis was used. The descriptive analysis was useful in the sense that the researcher found absolute numbers to summarise individual variables and find patterns. The nature of analysis characterised farmers in relation to their demographic and socio-economic data, livelihood strategies, adaptation and mitigation strategies. Results showed that Leribe farmers’ crop production was affected by climate change impact through yield loss, change of farming method, food shortages and depleted water sources and abandonment of engagement in agriculture for some farmers. The impacts saw farmers losing livelihoods, income generation, and inability to provide food for their families. Farmers seemed to have been surviving through crop production before climate change impacted on their rain fed agriculture and their livestock had endured the impact of climate change and the new methods in agriculture had helped them to continue to grow crops. In order for the farmers in Leribe adapt and mitigate, it is essential for NGOs to adequately capacitate the staff so that they (staff) inculcate knowledge to farmers for efficient implementation of adaptation and mitigation strategies which will assist in dealing with impact of climate change. It is recommended that there should be shift in focus and support efforts to come up with a new plan of action that will see adaptive capacity of farmers improved when climate change impact on the farmers’ capacity to grow crops. More understanding and increased knowledge of adaptation and mitigation will see more production and food insecurity will not be a threat. More funding by government will help NGOs build more capacity to farmers, diversification of farming methods and providing farmers with tools for accountability will help farmers scale up their production
Evaluating climate change adaptation strategies for disaster risk management: case study for Bethlehem wheat farmers, South Africa
No full textThe most important Agro-climate factors of primary agricultural production are temperature and rainfall. The impact of climate change is seen the best in the agricultural industry. The vulnerability of agriculture to climate change has become an important issue because of reduced crop productivity that is experienced by farmers. Wheat is the second staple crop in South Africa, maize is the first. The main dryland winter wheat production in South Africa is in the Free State province, in the areas surrounding Bethlehem. This study was carried out in Bethlehem. The objectives are to review the Disaster Risk Management framework in South Africa and its role in agriculture and the sustainability of food security, to explore the perception that commercial farmers have on climate change and how it influences their wheat production, to evaluate the adaption options open to commercial farmers, and to assess the impact that these adaptation options have on climate change and wheat crops by using the crop simulation model DSSAT. This study established that South African Policy and the legislative framework on Disaster Risk Management is well in existence and articulated to address the vulnerability of food security because of climate change and any form of disaster. The South African national legislative framework and strategies for disaster risk reduction appear to be in cohesion with the regional strategies. 97.1% of the sampled farmers perceive that there has been some change in the climate, 2.9% of the farmers were not sure whether there was a change or not. The farmers perceive climate change by observing that there is an increase in temperature and there are alterations in temperature ranges (average minimum and maximum temperatures) and there is an alteration in temporal variations. The farmers’ observations are that there is an alteration in the rainfall pattern, particularly a reduction in the rainfall amount received per year. On mitigation measures, the three most common internal farming adaptation measures indicated by the sampled wheat farmers in Bethlehem are: changing the planting time (23.6%), changing the crop (22%), and changing the cultivars (15.7%). The result indicated that changing the cultivars, changing the planting date and to have better fertilizer level management are some of the favorite adaptation measures the farmers use to mitigate crop yield losses due to climate change. The model shows all three cultivars performing better on later planting dates than earlier planting dates. Elands performed higher than all the other cultivars under all the fertilizer management levels. The highest grain yield was 3.4 t ha-1 for Eland. SST 124 and Betta DN were 1.5 and 1.4 tha-1 respectively under higher fertilizer management levels (75kg Nha-1). Elands performed higher under low fertilizer management levels (25kg Nha-1) with a yield of 2.4 tha-1 followed by the 1.1 and 1.0 tha-1 of SST 124 and Betta-DN respectively. Late planting combined with medium fertilizer levels (50kg Nha-1) surpassed the early planting combined with 75kg Nha-1 in yield by 32%, 26% and 17% for Elands, SST 124 and Betta-DN respectively. Changing to cultivars such as Elands, combined with late planting dates and a medium level of fertilizer management, is suggested as a solution to mitigate yield loss due to climate change, where a yield of 2.5 t ha-1 is a 70% probability. Changing cultivars, planting dates and fertilizer levels may be one of the strategies that can be adopted towards mitigating the risk of crop losses and thus improving food security. Such measures should be supported in terms of research resources and training
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Get PDFThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Comparison of energy available for evapotranspiration under in-field rainwater harvesting with wide and narrow runoff strips
Get PDFVariations on the Author
Get PDF“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Get PDFWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
Dispelling the Myths Behind First-author Citation Counts
Get PDFWe conducted a full-scale evaluative citation analysis study of scholars in the XML research field to explore just how different from each other author rankings resulting from different citation counting methods actually are, and to demonstrate the capability of emerging data and tools on the Web in supporting more realistic citation counting methods. Our results contest some common arguments for the continued
use of first-author citation counts in the evaluation of scholars, such as high correlations between author rankings by first-author citation counts and other citation
counting methods, and high costs of using more realistic citation counting methods that are not well-supported by the ISI databases. It is argued that increasingly available digital full text research papers make it possible for citation analysis studies to go beyond what the ISI databases have directly supported and to employ more
sophisticated methods
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